"nested" lookup tables

[dlazenby]

Using FM7, Win XP, for medical-oriented project. Am using lookup tables pretty extensively in my project and interested in "nested" functionality so that my lookup tables/corresponding fields are smaller/more manageable in the layout section.

I will try to use a car database analogy to represent what I would like.

Consider the car dealer/seller who has a field in his master database for a car (e.g. to be bought/trader). We'll call it field 1. Rather than typing it in it (e.g. Toyota; Camry; 1987; 4 door;) it is a drop down list or menu (with submenus) that would give him the choice of all the possible cars out there. For this example the drop down menu's first level would be car brand (e.g. Toyota, Honda, Ford, etc). Choosing Toyota (e.g. mouse rollover) would show the Toyota car-makes as a submenu (e.g. Camry, Tercel, etc.). The next submenu would be year (e.g. 1987, etc) and the next submenu would be model (e.g. 4 door vs 2 door etc).

Now, I know you are saying just have field 1: car brand; field 2: car make; field 3: year; field 4: model. True, but this will make my medical layouts bloated.

My medical database may have 10,000 diseases, operations, medications, etc and if I could break it down into submenu functionality this would be awesome for me.

For example, patient comes in and has 10 different diseases that I need to record which would each have their own field in the database.

Patient says: "I had a heart valve replaced in 1987". My disease drop down menu would be say 12 categories (e.g. cardiac, pulmonary, GI, neuro, etc). So the choice would be Cardiac-->that would then give me a submenu with choices like heart attack, pericarditis, infected valve, etc. The next submenu would then be more specific- for example if it was valvular endocarditis- the choices might be the different valves- aortic vs mitral vs tricuspid vs pulmonic vs prosthetic.

I am sure this would require some code; I don't know if you could modify a tree menu to do this.

Any suggestions?

Thanks,

Doug Lazenby

[The Shadow]

I did a simple example with drop-down lists you can find at:

http://www.fmforums.com/threads/showflat.php?Number=106269

It demonstrates how to do something like you're describing using related value lists.